Dec

23

Watching an episode of Pawn Stars. In reality I like to see what items people bring to the pawn shop to either sell or pawn.

The owners seem to a have large shop full of all kinds of collectibles. My main concern is Rick (owns shop with his father ) constantly has to call in outside experts to evaluate or verify authenticity. To be in that business you better know a little bit about ephemera and coins and ball cards and cast iron toys and still and mechanical banks as knock offs are everywhere that antiques have risen in value. Also include art.

Is this like the Market trader having to rely on others to make important buy or sell decisions and not learning on their own to make critical educated decisions?

Regards,

Alan

Sam Marx comments:

I've watched Pawn Stars a few times & the gullability of people when they need a loan is amazing. It's like watching a car accident. Also, I would venture that the average of all the IQ's of people pawning items is below average. I would also guess that the vast majority of those items pawned are never redeemed. Confession: I pawned an item once, an emergency, but I took it out of pawn 2 days later.

I know that junk car yards are connected to find parts between themselves, it's like having a vast inventory. I don't believe pawn dealers are connected this way.

Has anyone ever thought of working a deal with these pawn brokers and putting their items on an internet website. Something like an Ebay for pawn brokers or maybe they are doing it themselves ?

Thomas Miller writes:

This show is a great example of the ageless advice "never try to bullshit a bullshitter" you'll never win. I suspect most pawnbrokers love the art of haggling and would rather sell to someone one face to face to use their skills to get the best price, rather than through internet auctions.

Art Cooper adds:

Related to this, see the article "Payday Lenders Go Hunting" on p. C1 of today's WSJ, on the expanding operations of such companies as Advance America, which make unsecured loans at annualized interest rates as high as 391%.